Jump to content
 
  • entries
    37
  • comment
    1
  • views
    516

Building the landscape


RichardS

161 views

d31b9-general-view-14-rjs-47j.jpg?w=1024Boscarne station on the heritage Bodmin & Wenford Railway.
There were virtually no trees of any size at the time the model depicts.
Copyright: Richard Slipper 2016

The topography of Bosmelin (Boscarne Junction) is not straightforward as it comprises a variety of landscapes and the associated plant life.

The railway lines sit on a ledge carved into a hillside. The single line approaching from the west runs along the valley side whereas the two lines exiting the junction area leave on embankments and both cross the river on plate girder bridges. The river almost turns 90 degrees to head north at this point.

As previously mentioned the river is about 25 feet below the level of the railway while the cut into the hillside is about 20 feet deep. The land to the north of the railway then climbs further. The river valley after the bridges is initially quite steep.

I’ve shown a small part of an old 2.5″ OS map below which shows the contours. Copyright: Ordnance Survey

5d562-1-25000-boscarne-contours-copy.jpg

Very few modellers have the room to produce a layout to scale. Almost all of us have to compress things a bit. For a modeller who’s taste is for landscape and scenery rather than an urban environment Boscarne Junction is quite an attractive proposition – a rural freight interchange with trains arriving from four directions (if the Wenford line is included) and only a handful of rural buildings, a signal box, a ground frame and the requisite huts.

Fortunately, I have been able to keep most of the length but the width, as is usually the case, is where some more serious compression is necessary. And this is where the back drop will have an important role to play but more of that another time. The sketch below which is not to scale shows the an approximate cross section of the layout.

4470a-bosmelin-illustrative-cross-sectio

Those of you who have been paying attention (you have been haven’t you?) will soon spot that the boards presently under construction (and as approximately shown in he sketch above) are insufficiently wide to include the compressed water meadows and water courses. These will be part of phase two which will comprise additional scenic boards along the front of the layout.

The river valley and the bridges for the tracks will be on a curve and this has necessitated the remodelling of the baseboards, deepening the sides, extending the depth and adding a new base. Here’s a photo. Don’t judge the woodwork please, it’ll all be hidden and is functional.

d2d14-img_20200421_162837.jpg?w=1024

The next step I plan to take is to decide upon the profiles of the landscape behind the tracks. I need to do this in order to finalise the track alignment of the 4 lines in relation to the bank which runs quite close to Siding 2 (S2 in the sketch). Once this is done I can determine the position of the tracks on the curved board and thus the places the bridges will be positioned. It’s very much an iterative process.

Thanks for reading. More soon. Stay safe!


View the full article

0 Comments


Recommended Comments

There are no comments to display.

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...